d her ignorance, would be an encumbrance to
him. Better obliterate her as much as possible.

He showed a more manly anger now, but would not agree. She on her side
was more persistent, and he had doubts whether she could be trusted in
his absence. But by indignation and contempt for her taste he completely
maintained his ascendency; and finally taking her before a little cross
and altar that he had erected in his bedroom for his private devotions,
there bade her kneel, and swear that she would not wed Samuel Hobson
without his consent. 'I owe this to my father!' he said.

The poor woman swore, thinking he would soften as soon as he was ordained
and in full swing of clerical work. But he did not. His education had
by this time sufficiently ousted his humanity to keep him quite firm;
though his mother might have led an idyllic life with her faithful
fruiterer and greengrocer, and nobody have been anything the worse in the
world.

Her lameness became more confirmed as time went on, and she seldom or
never left the house in the long southern thoroughfare, where she seemed
to be pining her heart away. 'Why mayn't I say to Sam that I'll marry
him? Why mayn't I?' she would murmur plaintively to herself when nobody
was near.

Some four years after this date a middle-aged man was standing at the
door of the largest fruiterer's shop in Aldbrickham. He was the
proprietor, but to-day, instead of his usual business attire, he wore a
neat suit of black; and his window was partly shuttered. From the
railway-station a funeral procession was seen approaching: it passed his
door and went out of the town towards the village of Gaymead. The man,
whose eyes were wet, held his hat in his hand as the vehicles moved by;
while from the mourning coach a young smooth-shaven priest in a high
waistcoat looked black as a cloud at the shop keeper standing there.

_December_ 1891.

FOR CONSCIENCE' SAKE

CHAPTER I

Whether the utilitarian or the intuitive theory of the moral sense be
upheld, it is beyond question that there are a few subtle-souled persons
with whom the absolute gratuitousness of an act of reparation is an
inducement to perform it; while exhortation as to its necessity would
breed excuses for leaving it undone. The case of Mr. Millborne and Mrs.
Frankland particularly illustrated this, and perhaps something more.

There were few figures better known to the local crossing-sweeper than
Mr. Millborne's, in